Typewriting machine



Patented Nev. 27, 1928.

v UNITED STATES 1,693,144 PATENT OFFICE.

, WIIILIAM F. HELMOND,' 0F HARTFORD, CONNECTICUT, ASSIGNOR TO UNDERWOOD ELLIOTT FISHER COMPANY, OF NEW YORK, Y., A CORPORATION OF'DELAWARE.

TYIPEWBITIN G MACHINE.

Application filed October 17, 1925. Serial No. 62,998.

This invention relates to typewriting ma-- chines,-and more specifically to anti-friction carriage-bearin s that promote a free easyrunning, to-an -fro movement for the carriage, and the present invention may be regarded as an improvement upon the ,construction shown and described in the patent to Barnard, No. 949,723, datedFebruai-y-IS, 1910. r

In the standard Underwood typewriting machine, the rectangular carriage-frame is supported at the ront and rear by rails.

The weight of the carriage is mainly supported by sliding carriage-bearings that ride upon the rear carriage-rail, and the tendency is to increase this carrying weight by the practice of adding extra parts and attachments.

The release and sudden arrest of the powerdriven carriage at a column-stop position, and the violent shifting of the carriage rightward against a'marginal stop at the commencement.0f a new Line, both contribute to set up violent reactions within these carriagebearings,

In the development of the present invention, it is assumed that the carriage-bearings have two primary forces to resist; one, a vertical downward force due to the weight of the carriage, and the other a horizontal force due to the sudden stoppage of the carriage in both directions. of its travel. The application of the parallelogram of forces to these two component forces,,develops a resultant force that bisects the axis of the rail at an angle of approximately forty-five degrees from the horizontal and at the rear. Thus in the present structure it is proposedto provide the rear of the carriage with two spaced-0d carriers, each carrier provided with a horizontally-disposed anti-friction roll to bear against the front face of the cylindrical rail with the rolling flat face thereof tangent to the face of the rail at a horizontal axial position; and also rovided with a second antifriction roll to ear tangentially .against the face of the, rail at a point indicated by the intersection of the resultant of the forces, or in a plane approximately fortyfivedegrees above'the horizontal axis of the rail, .which provides a bearing-face against the rail that is at right angles to the direction of the resultant of theforces.

, The two horizontal rolls bearing against the front face of the rail, arrest the vibrations from the heavy manifolding impact of the types, effectively co-operate with the rail to maintain parallelism between the carriage movement and the printing position, effectively avoid, through the co-operation of the companion rolls, any transverse'play in the carriage, and-reduce the surface contact between the co-acting face-bearings to a minimum.

The weight of the carriage alone will'maintain the two sets of anti-friction rolls in proper engagement with the carriage-rail during the usual manipulation of the typewriter, but to prevent any possible displacement ofthe bearings during a carriage-shifting movement, each roll-carrier is formed with the usual tongue or collar that encompasses the lower half of the'cylindrical carriage-rail.

The added weight of the long carriage tends to develop carriage-bearings and re-' duces the speed of typing proportionately, but, with co-operative anti-friction roller bearings for the carriage that coact in pairs .the only adjustment required for this improved anti-friction carriage-bearing.

Still another feature provides that instead of assembling the various parts to the carriage-frame, one by one, the rolls may first be assembled to the carrier as a complete bearing-unit and subsequently secured to the carriage as a bearing-unit and without adjustment.

Other features and advantages will hereinafter appear.

In the accompanying drawings,

Figure 1 is a fragmentary transverse sec- .tional view of a typewriting-machine carriage' and supporting rails embodying the invention.

Figure 2 is a top plan view of portions of the carriage, showing the relative positions of the carriage-bearing units.

Figure 3 is a detail perspective view of one of the improved carriage-bearings assembled as a unit, and adjusted to the cylindrical carria e-rail.

, type-bar 10 strikes rearwardly againsta platen 11, which is rotatably mounted in the ends 12 of a platen-frame. The platenframe is supported upon a carriage 13,- which is longitudinally slidable on a cylindrical rail or way-rod 14, supported at the .rear of the machine, as at 15, and by the usual center roll 15 bearing upon a front rail 15; A fanfold attachment 16 is here shown mounted upon the carriage 13 and extends rearwardly in the well-known manner of the Smith-Vernery machine. I

In order that the carriage 13 may be accurately positioned, I provide a pair of improved anti-friction roll-carriers or brackets designated as a unit by the reference character 17, and each carrier comprising a substantially horizontal body-portion 18, having a collar formed by a depending tongue 19 that curves downwardly and rearwardly to encompass the lower half of the cylindrical rail 14, and locate the carriage upon said rail.

The body-portion 18 is formed with ahorizontal, forwardly-extending offset-ear 21, upon the face of which is mounted a horizontally-disposed anti-friction bearing-roll 22, rotatable about a screw 23, threaded into the ear 21. This roll 22 may be provided with anti-friction balls interposed between the roll and screw, as shown and described more specifically in the above-mentioned patent to Barnard. The body-portion 18 is also formed with a second ear 24 offset at an angle of approximately 45 degrees. This angle, of course, may be variable according to the particular design of the machine. A second antifriction bearing-roll 25 is mounted upon a screw 26 threaded into the angular ear 24, and like the roll 22, may be provided with ball-bearings to reduce axial friction to a minimum. These two bearing rolls 22 and- 25 may be assembled to each carrier 17 as a manufactured unit and subsequently assembled to the carriage as a complete bearings unit.

On the upper face of the horizontal bodyportion 18 of the roll-carrier 17, a locating tongue 18 isv formed to enter a suitable groove of the carriage-frame, and the carrier is secured in position to an under face of the carriage by means of screws 18 passing through the carriage-frame from the top to enter threaded holes in said carrier.

A pair of these-bearing-units 17 is assembled to the carriage-frame; one unit adjacent each carrier-end, as shown at Figure 2, and thesetwo units coacting with the center roll 15 and the front rail 15' combine to. provide a triangular or three-point suspension for the, traveling carriage. p

A t Figure 1, it'will be noted that the aperturef formed in and by the tongue .19 is'not a folding.

true concentric" opening relative to the cylindrical rail 14, and that certain inner face-sections of the tongue are gouged out .for railclearance and form an irregular opening. It is desirable that the tongues 19 shall not contact with the Whole surface of the rail 14 at any time. Three short bearing-face-sections 2O engaging with the cylindrical face of the rail have a free running fit upon the rail.

It will also be noted at Figure 1 that a horizontal axial line drawn through the rail 14 bisects aperipheralpoint where the roll 22 bears against the front face of the rail, and thus most effectively resists any side play or horizontal displacement in the carriage rearwardly, and provides a firm resistance to combat the impact of the types in heavy mani- In Figure 1 the direction of a component force resulting from the weight of the carriage is indicated by a vertical line A; and another force resultant from the effect of violently checking the movement of the carriage in both directions that reacts horizontally from the rear to separate the rolls 22 from contact with the rail is indicated by a horizontal line B; resolving these two component carriage-forces towards the axis of the rail 14, develops an approximate resultant .force in a direction indicated by the line C, which, as shown, bisects the point where the rolls 25 contact with the face ofthe rail. The two roll's 25 bear the bulk of the weight of the carriage; the rolls 22 co-operatetherewith to hold the rolls 25 at their indicated angular positions, and the two rolls 25, throughtheir angular positions, co-operate with the weight of the carriage to maintain the rolls 22 in contact with the front face of the rail 14.

It will be noted that this improved carriage-bearing unit provides flat peripheral roll-faces on the carriage to bear upon the cylindrical face of the guide-rod, and that the surface engagement therebetween is practically a knife-edge rolling contact, and the carriage-movement is frictionless to a correshort carriage laden with various attachments 1s shuttled back and forthupon the carriagerails with a corresponding increase in frietional drag, the anti-friction rolls bearing upon the rail prevent this extra weight from correspondmgl increasingthe sliding resistance at the co ar-bearing faces and this collar -face-resistance becomes uniform for all we ghts and lengths of carriages; that the to their axes which effectively cut the lines of resisting strain at right angles and reduce the associated friction to a minimum.

Variations may be resorted to within the scope of the invention, and portions of the improvements may be used without others.

Having thus described my invention, I claim:

1. In a typewriting machine, the combination with a way-rod and a carriage to be guided thereby, of guiding units articulated to the carriage near the ends thereof, each unit formed to fit a locating seat upon the carriage, and means to secure the unit upon' the carriage, each unit having a collar and a pairof rolls, all of said rolls being betwen said collars, each collar fitted to said wayrod to support and guide the carriage thereon and prevent upward displacement of the carriage, each of said units having one carriagesupporting roll to relieve the friction between the collar and the way-rod when the carriage is weighted, said carriage-supporting roll bearing upon the rear upper crownportion of the way-rod to relieve the friction of the collar upon said crown, and to form the main support for the weight of the carriage at that end, and the other roll in each pair mounted to bear against the front side of the way-rod to support the carriage against the blows of the type falling upon the front of the platen.

2. In a typewriting machine, the combination with a way-rod and a carriage to be guided thereby, of guidin units articulated to the carriage ad'acent eac end thereof, each unit formed to fit a locating seat upon the carriage with means to secure each unit to the carriage, each unit including a collar operative to slide along the way-rod to effectively guide a short length of carriage, said units also arranged to include a pair of relatively disposed anti-friction rolls mounted thereon to bear upon the way rod for a carriage-supporting rolling contact to relieve the collar of excess sliding frictional contact upon the way-rod under the heavier load of a long carriage.

3. In a typewriting machine, the combination with a way-rod and a carriage to be guided thereby, of guiding units articulated to the carriage adjacent each end thereof, each unit formed to fit a locating seat upon the carriage with means to secure each unit to the carriage, each unit including a collar slidable along the way-rod to guide the carriage under a normal load and a pair of rolls bearing upon the way-rod for a carriagesupporting rolling contact when the carriage is heavily loaded, each pair of rolls being relativelydisposed to relieve the collars of excessive frictional drag upon the way-rod by presenting way-rod-bearing faces that are tangent to the rod and parallel to the axes of the rolls, to prevent wedging ofthe rolls and speed up the travel of the carriage.

4. In a front-strike typewriting machine, the combination with a traveling carriage and a stationary rail, of a two-part carriagebearing unit secured to the carriage to engage with the rail and guide the carriage, one part of said unit operative under a normal weight of carriage, to slide over the rail with a minimum of friction, and the other part of said unit being operative under a laden carriage, to roll upon the surface of the rail without increasing the frictional engagement of the slide upon the rail.

5. In a typewriting machine, the combination with a traveling carriage and a stationary round railtherefor, of a bearing unit secured to the carriage to engage with the rail, said unit including a plurality of rolls disposed around the rail to prevent displacement of the carriage, each roll having flat rail-engaging faces that are parallel to their axes and operate to prevent roll-wedging strains during the travel of the carriage.

WILLIAM F. HELMOND. 

